As I mentioned earlier, Carnival responded to Senator Rockefeller’s letter inquiring into the cruise line’s avoidance of U.S taxes and its refusal to reimburse federal agencies for services rendered with what I characterized the other day as a "screw you!" letter.
Today news sources are reporting that Senator Rockefeller characterized Carnival’s response as "shameful."
Yesterday cruise passengers at Port Everglades waited for up to four hours in long lines to be processed by customs and border protection officials.
Due to budget cuts caused by the federal budget sequester, there were only three U.S. Customs Border Protection Officers working.
There were also long lines of passengers waiting to board
Last night NBC Rock Center with Brian Williams aired a special on Carnival CEO Micky Arison who has a net worth reportedly of around $5,700,000,000.
One of the secrets to Arison’s wealth is that his cruise line, Carnival, according to NBC News, paid around 0.6% in taxes at the federal, state, local and international levels
USA TODAY has an interesting article today entitled "Titans of the Cruise Industry See Net Worth Rise."
Forbes’ annual ranking of the world’s billionaires for 2013 lists Carnival mogul Micky Arison at No. 211 with a net worth of $5.7 billion, up from $4.7 billion a year ago. Arison’s net worth has nearly doubled
At this moment the 210 foot Coast Guard cutter Vigorous is escorting the disabled Carnival Triumph back to the U.S. The Coast Guard performs a remarkable job responding to emergencies such as cruise ship fires and the numerous helicopter medevacs involving ill or injured passengers who need medical treatment back here in the U.S.
But
Barron’s reports that Royal Caribbean Cruises’ top executive recently bailed out on a large block of cruise line stock just before the cruise line’s shares touched a new 52-week intra-day high.
On December 13th Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Richard Fain sold 143,140 shares of RCL stock for $4,964,095, an average of $34.68 each. Barron’s says
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Today I read an interesting case analysis from the Journal of Business Case Studies (May/June 2012), which studied the business model of the second largest cruise company in the world, Royal Caribbean Cruises, Ltd.
The article is entitled "Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd.: Innovation At A Cost?" (click on the pdf link)
The article
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Over the past week, CNN has aired a number of special programs about the cruise industry, revealing a number of things that the industry would prefer you not know.
The segment below focuses on the cruise lines’ efforts to avoid U.S taxes,
By registering their cruise ships in foreign countries, cruise lines avoid most U.S.
Carnival held its annual meeting this morning at a hotel on Miami Beach. But today was different from the usually dull, self-serving pontificating by cruise line executives when a group demanding that Carnival pay its fair share of taxes appeared on the scene.
An organization called "1Miami" challenged Carnival and its CEO Micky
This week the United States Coast Guard rescued two cruise passengers – one ill young man from the NCL Gem cruise ship sailing off the coast of North Carolina and a second young woman from the Explorer cruise ship who was suffering from an appendicitis attack near Key West Florida.
When we report on these type of rescues
An interesting editorial appears today in the Jamaica Gleaner about a proposal to increase the head tax on visitors who arrive via air to Jamaica from $10 to $20. The writer characterizes this proposed increase as unfair considering the head tax on cruise passengers is only $2 per person. These taxes help pay the Tourism Enhancement Fund (TEF) which funds projects
Today the Move On organization published an article entitled "Pay Your Taxes? These Ten Companies Didn’t." The article points out that while most of us U.S. taxpayers struggle to pay our fair share of taxes, there are certain corporations which have tax avoidance down to an art.
The list is complied by Senator Bernie Sanders, an Independent from the state
One of the little know facts about the cruise industry is that it pays virtually no U.S. taxes.
The cruise lines take advantage of an obscure provision in the U.S. tax code which permits shipping companies to evade taxes by incorporating overseas and flying the flags of foreign countries. That’s why Carnival is incorporated in
The popular on line cruise community CruiseCritic.com recently ran an article "Top 10 Reasons To Cruise." By the time I read reason number 3 – "Cruise Ships are Family Friendly" – I was repulsed enough that I felt compelled to explain why the Cruise Critic article was dangerously inaccurate.
Cruise Critic published the photo (below) of the
The Anchorage Daily News has an interesting editorial today by Alaska resident and green water scientist Gershon Cohen entitled "Power to the People, Not the Cruise Industry." He characterizes Governor Parnell’s decision to reduce the cruise "head tax" from $46 a cruise passenger to only $19 as a sell out to the Miami-based cruise
A fascinating article appeared in USA Today’s Cruise Blog by Gene Sloan – "Titans of the Cruise Industry See Their Net Worth Soar."
This is an amazing article reporting on the Forbes 400 richest people in the U.S., which includes Carnival fat cat billionaires Mickey Arison, Royal Caribbean’s Pritzker family, and entrepreneur Leon
The so-called "Alaska Cruise Association" (more properly called the Miami Cruise Association) has been caught exaggerating the effects of Alaska’s $50 per person "head tax."
The Juneau Empire reports in an article by Pat Forgey entitled "Attack On A Tax" that the cruise industry is misleading the public. Cruise lines claim that cruise prices have dropped as low as $300, and the $50 tax is driving passengers away
